It’s part of the increasingly complicated way in which the US reports, or rather, doesn’t report, on troop levels and details in its ongoing wars. The report on the Fort Carson troops includes a lot of questions, including timing of deployment, and how many are new deployments,as opposed to replacing existing troops simply rotating out of the country.

Those are big questions, and there are simply no answers. The Pentagon isn’t officially confirming any of the details on this matter, and while those familiar say the deployment is likely to happen sometime in early 2018, even that is just speculation.

While Defense Secretary James Mattis had promised improved transparency, President Trump’s declaration that “America’s enemies must never know our plans” is indeed ushering in a new era of unprecedented secrecy, and these reports about deployments from bases might be the closest we ever get to confirmation of overseas escalations in the future.